Archive for May, 2007
Split your guests into 2 teams, and give each team 13 cards in 1 suit.
eg all in clubs or all in diamonds.
Better to use a different colour for each team.
The first guest in each team stands above the dustbin with the long edge of his playing card balancing on his nose.
They now allow the card to fall and hope it lands in the bin.
After the first player has dropped all his cards, he retrieves the ones that didn’t land in the bin and passes them to the next player.
This continues until the first team to get all cards in the bin is the winner
It’s quite tricky to get the final card in.
Birthday party game
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Christian influences spread into Celtic lands by the year 800, and Pope Boniface IV declared November 1 as All Saint’s Day. This day was a time to honor all saints and martyrs. This was considered an attempt to replace the pagan holiday with a church sanctioned holiday.
Also referred to as ‘All-hallows’ or ‘All-hallowmas’, the night before was called ‘All-hallows Eve’ or ‘Halloween.’ Two-hundred years later, the Church again stepped in and made November 2, ‘All Souls Day’ in honor of the dead. Same as with ‘Samhain’, bonfires, parades and festivities took place, and costumes of angels, saints, and devils became popular. These three celebrations became known as ‘Hallowmas.’
European immigrants coming to America brought costumes with them, but rigid Protestant beliefs in New England hampered celebrations. An American version of Halloween started to develop as European ethnic groups and American Indian groups meshed the celebration with their own beliefs. Again, the harvest was a focal point, and gatherings always included stories of the deceased, fortune telling, dancing and singing. Ghost stories were apparent in Colonial celebrations, and mischief making abounded. By mid-19th Century, autumn festivals were abundant, but Halloween itself was not mainstream yet.
The 1800s with its influx of immigrants, especially Irishmen fleeing the country’s potato famine, popularized Halloween more so than previously. Using both the English and Irish traditions, an American culture of Halloween celebration sprung up, and going door-to-door started. Young women took to making predictions on their husbands’ futures using yarns and mirrors, and by the late 1800s, Halloween became more a time of community than a serious holiday. Ghosts, witches, and pranks were less commonplace. The holiday lost much superstitious and religious ties.
Individuals look forward to the last night of October no matter what their ages! Halloween means a celebration of individuals of all ages running around in their costumes and parties with friends, neighbors and relatives. It’s a time when people can and do wear what they want and eat sweets voraciously. Halloween was not always this way however. The origins of Halloween date back thousands of years, to a festival that was Celtic, called ‘Samhain’ (SOW-IN).
Celts lived in what is now the United Kingdom, Northern France and Ireland some two thousand years ago. ‘Samhain’ was their New Year and came each November 1. This period was the beginning of the winter months and marked the end of summer and harvest. It was a time of cold and darkness. Therefore it became associated with death, and ‘Samhain’ was considered the crossing over of the dead and the living.
Ghosts of the dead were believed to walk the earth again on ‘Samhain’ causing trouble and destruction to food supplies. Druids, who were Celtic priests believed it to be easier to predict the future at this time, and the whims of nature were thought to be prevalent. The prophecies made by the Druids brought comfort and solace during the long, bleak winters.
The Druids made bonfires and sacrificed animals and crops to the Celtic Gods. They also were in costumes, and made these costumes of animal skins. They wore the heads of animals and made predictions to each other while wearing these and they told each others’ fortunes. These bonfires were also considered sacred and after the celebration, the hearth fires were lit from the bonfires.
Romans eventually conquered the Celts territories and ruled for four-hundred years. ‘Samhain’ was combined with a Roman festival called ‘Feralia’ and another called ‘Pomona’. ‘Feralia’ was a celebration of the passing of the dead, while ‘Feralia’ was the Goddess of fruit and trees. This is how ‘bobbing for apples’ got started in modern day traditions as ‘Pomona’ used the apple symbolically.
